{"id":682953,"date":"2026-05-20T12:31:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T12:31:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/682953\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T12:31:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T12:31:18","slug":"football-derbies-who-owns-trademarks-like-el-clasico-or-fla-flu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/682953\/","title":{"rendered":"Football derbies: who owns trademarks like \u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d or \u201cFla-Flu\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Football matches between rival teams from the same city, region or country are often called \u201cderbies\u201d. But that term alone is not always enough to reflect the history and deep-seated rivalry between the two opposing sides. Sometimes they need a name of their own.<\/p>\n

In Spain, Real Madrid vs. Barcelona clashes are known as \u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d. In Italy, you might attend the \u201cDerby della Madonnina\u201d, or AC Milan vs. Internazionale (Inter). And Brazil is home to \u201cFla-Flu\u201d, or Flamengo vs. Fluminense.<\/p>\n

Over time, such monikers transcend the action on the pitch and enter popular culture, repeated by countless fans, media and sponsors around the world. In many ways, the great derbies are brands in themselves, acknowledged by clubs<\/a> and written about extensively<\/a> by sports journalists.<\/p>\n

When it comes to intellectual property (IP), ownership of a brand that involves assets shared by two or more entities can be complicated, especially if there is antagonism between them. So, who might own the trademark rights<\/a> to a classic derby name: the clubs, the league or another entity entirely?<\/p>\n

\u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d trademark dispute<\/p>\n

The Spanish derby is one of the most watched sporting events in the world, with the October 2025 edition drawing an estimated 650 million viewers<\/a>. But classics are rarely born as such; their status is achieved over time. The first match between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid CF took place in 1902 and the myth has been building ever since. The rivalry intensified through historic results and dramatic encounters, such as the Copa del Rey game of 1943, when Real Madrid scored 11 goals against Barcelona.<\/p>\n

More recently, the battle was amplified by the competition between Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, the faces of Bar\u00e7a and Real, respectively, with each vying to be known as the greatest player in the world.<\/p>\n

Unsurprisingly, the historic rivalry has stirred much commercial interest. In May 2023, La Liga, the premier division in which Bar\u00e7a and Real play, sought trademark protection for \u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d from the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office. When the news became public, the clubs attempted to register the trademark themselves.<\/p>\n

They were successful too \u2013 at first. But the league appealed this decision. And, in January 2025, the Spanish courts sided with La Liga<\/a>, rejecting the clubs\u2019 application and confirming the league\u2019s earlier trademark registration.<\/p>\n

Trademark protection primarily gives the owner the exclusive right to prevent all unauthorised third parties from using it for similar goods and services. This affects commercial exploitation such as merchandising, sponsorship or branded media content.<\/p>\n

\"GettyImages-2269545927-94702.webp\"<\/p>\n

Getty Images\/Alex Caparros \u2013 UEFA<\/p>\n

FC Barcelona v Real Madrid CF during UEFA Women’s Champions League, Nou Camp, April 02, 2026, Barcelona, Spain.<\/p>\n

However, La Liga having commercial control over the term \u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d does not prevent a fan from purchasing merchandise (such as a scarf) and wearing it. Similarly, journalists may refer to it in written content without this being considered trademark use. By contrast, if a club markets or sells goods or services under a trademark registered to a third party \u2013 in this case, La Liga \u2013 such use would be unauthorized and could be prohibited.<\/p>\n

The \u201cEl Cl\u00e1sico\u201d case illustrates how the organizer of a competition may claim ownership over the commercial branding of its flagship events, even where those events depend on rivalries between specific teams. It is just one example of how such rivalries can come under trademark law; there are many others.<\/p>\n

\u201cFla-Flu\u201d Consortium and Grenal: when Brazilian football rivals team up<\/p>\n

In Brazil, games involving any combination of Rio de Janeiro\u2019s \u201cbig four\u201d clubs \u2013 Flamengo, Fluminense, Vasco and Botafogo \u2013 are considered classic derbies. The clash between Clube de Regatas do Flamengo and Fluminense Football Club, however, may be the most iconic.<\/p>\n

The name \u201cFla-Flu\u201d was coined by journalist M\u00e1rio Filho<\/a> in the 1930s. Brazilian novelist Nelson Rodrigues once described \u201cFla-Flu\u201d as \u201cthe Karamazov brothers of soccer\u201d, likening the intensity, drama and emotional depth of the rivalry to Dostoevsky\u2019s classic novel The Brothers Karamazov. However, fierce competition does not mean that clubs cannot cooperate off the pitch.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Flamengo and Fluminense \u2013 together known as the Fla-Flu Consortium \u2013 teamed up to co-manage Maracan\u00e3 Stadium, the shared arena in which their rivalry plays out. Five years later, they won the right<\/a> to oversee the stadium until 2044.<\/p>\n

This kind of arrangement offers a useful analogy for IP law. In many jurisdictions, trademarks can have more than one owner, through what is commonly known as co-ownership, in which two or more people or entities can share legal rights over the same trademark.<\/p>\n

In 2024, for example, Gr\u00eamio FBPA and SC Internacional, rivals from the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, filed a joint trademark application for the name of their rivalry, \u201cGrenal\u201d, before the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) in Brazil (trademark application No. 937366293, in class 41). At the time of writing, the application was still pending.<\/p>\n

Challenges of joint trademark ownership over football derbies<\/p>\n

In principle, then, rival clubs can register a classic match name together, especially when it clearly refers to the encounter between them and derives its identity from both sides of the skirmish. A jointly owned trademark could then be used to license merchandise, media products or promotional campaigns connected to the fixture.<\/p>\n

But co-ownership has its challenges too.<\/p>\n

Trademark law ideally recommends clear agreements between co-owners regarding issues such as licensing, revenue sharing and enforcement against infringement. Without well-defined rules, joint ownership can lead to uncertainty about who is authorized to exploit or defend the mark.<\/p>\n

So, while co-ownership is legally possible, classic match names are often registered by a league, federation or other entity responsible for organizing the competition, as in Spain, rather than by the rival clubs themselves.<\/p>\n

Can a third-party file a football derby name as a trademark?<\/p>\n

Other parties may also become involved and complexities can arise when the derby name incorporates club names. In such cases, the proposed trademark may collide with the clubs\u2019 pre-existing trademark registrations or other rights.<\/p>\n

In 2009, Brazilian marketing company Banana Mark Assessoria de Marketing LTDA tried to trademark \u201cFla-Flu\u201d (trademark application No. 901848093). INPI rejected the application on the grounds that it reproduced or imitated Flamengo\u2019s trademarks \u201cFLA\u201d and \u201cFLA-TV\u201d, and Fluminense\u2019s trademarks \u201cFLU\u201d and \u201cFLU EDUCA\u00c7\u00c3O ESPORTIVA\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"GettyImages-2270608902-94702.webp\"<\/p>\n

Getty Images\/Wagner Meier<\/p>\n

Fluminense v Flamengo during Brasileirao 2026, Maracana Stadium, April 12, 2026, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.<\/p>\n

Also in Brazil, in 2012, an individual attempted to trademark the name \u201cSupercl\u00e1ssico\u201d (trademark application No. 904548333), used for many derbies, most notably Boca Juniors vs. River Plate in Argentina. INPI rejected the application, ruling that the term is generic, necessary, common, vulgar or simply descriptive (Article 124, VI, of the Industrial Property Act of Brazil).<\/p>\n

In countries that apply a first-to-file trademark system, it may be easier for third parties to file applications for derby names. In Italy, 3R Sport SRL, a company specializing in the production and sale of official sporting goods, registered \u201cDerby della Madonnina\u201d, otherwise known as the Derby di Milano, the clash between AC Milan and Inter (registration No. 2017000031338).<\/p>\n

Applications may be challenged as having been made in bad faith, and registered trademarks may be cancelled if the legitimate rights holders can establish that the registration was obtained in bad faith.<\/p>\n

Establishing distinctiveness of a derby\u2019s trademark<\/p>\n

Moreover, not every sign used as a trademark may be registered or protected. Even the names of classic derbies that carry historical and cultural weight may not meet the legal requirements for trademark registration, which include distinctiveness and availability. Trademark offices may therefore reject terms that are considered generic, purely descriptive or lacking distinctiveness.<\/p>\n

La Liga registered the composite mark \u201cELCL\u00c1SICO\u201d internationally in 2021, using the WIPO Madrid System (IRN No. 1619821<\/a>), but Brazil initially rejected the application. The Brazilian trademark office concluded that \u201cELCL\u00c1SICO\u201d is a commonly used expression without sufficiently distinctive form, and thus unregistrable (IRN No. 1619821, Brazilian trademark application No. 501619821). La Liga was later successful in trademarking \u201cLALIGA ELCL\u00c1SICO\u201d (IRN No. 1777017, Brazilian trademark application No. 501777017).<\/p>\n

So, who owns a derby name?<\/p>\n

From a legal standpoint, ownership of a classic derby name is not determined by sporting regulations. International federations such as FIFA do not regulate the naming or trademark ownership of such names. Rather, the matter is governed by regular trademark law. The question of who owns a \u201cclassic\u201d is less about any pre-existing right to the name and more about who brings that name into the trademark system.<\/p>\n

In the end, then, great rivalries extend far beyond the beautiful game itself. Rather than straightforward administrative decisions, disputes over derby names can become protracted legal battles every bit as thrilling as the matches themselves.<\/p>\n

About the author: Ana Clara Ribeiro is an attorney, writer, judicial expert and researcher. She is an IP attorney and partner at Baril Advogados, Curitiba, Brazil, and a Master\u2019s student in Intellectual Property and Innovation at INPI.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Football matches between rival teams from the same city, region or country are often called \u201cderbies\u201d. But that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":682954,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-682953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=682953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682953\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/682954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}